The essentialness of self care when your pet is dying and it’s the last thing on your mind.
I keep telling myself that I wrote a book on this stuff and I should be more sorted. Ironically though, in my book, I write about the importance letting yourself blubbery, snotty mess. About taking the time you need to let things move and sort and digest and release. I write a lot about self-care and about our own unique process (and how it looks different from everyone else’s). This week I took my own advice.
Let me tell you about it, this surreal week of mine. I feel like I’ve had about 16 baths (it was probably closer to 6 but they’ve been really really long, so long my hands and feet turn into raisins). I just want warmth. And Netflix. Both of those things. Kia and I have been doing some good cuddling. I have been hiking with Reilly. I have been dancing most mornings, in my kitchen, to my besties excellent Spotify playlists. I have been still and quiet. I crave manure to pick (come on ponies produce!). I have eaten my weight in chocolate and twist of lime tortilla chips (damn, they are good). I have been counting Kia’s breaths per minute several times a day and mildly obsessive about her breathing the remainder of the day. I have been dreaming up article titles like this one. Riding Diva bareback. Talking to girlfriends over hot chocolate. Crying. Planning where she will be buried and her ceremony, complete with which bulbs I need to plant (this redhead is very specific). Crying some more. Opening up space for people Kia and I haven’t seen in a while to come visit. I allowed myself to be whatever and wherever I needed to be, in preparation for all of it. In preparation for being the best steward for her that I possibly could be. As it turns out, and as I suspected, my self care is entwined with my ability to care for her – the paradoxical, beautiful truth.
